Saturday, November 25, 2006
Leave Gay Men Alone. The world is always rife with lunatic notions. Among the most pernicious widely believed today is the idea that gay men are so free now that they don't need gay bars, but can dispense with places where they can be alone with each other. Nothing could be further from the truth.
+
"Birds of a feather flock together." The human race has known that for a very long time:
Why, then, do we have such trouble with this concept in the United States today?
+
Endlessly we are lectured — indeed, practically pummelled — into accepting that we "should" ignore all differences among people and be friends with and spend essentially all our time with people with whom we share NOTHING. The ordinary course of human relationships rejects all such advice and compulsion. Decade after decade, century after century, people cling to their own kind. It's not rejection of others but simply affection for one's own.
+
It's not evil. It's not conspiratorial. It's just simple human nature. Why can't we ALL accept that, and let people be with whom they want to be without making it into a humungous moral issue?
+
Gay men are a pervasively (indeed astoundingly) oppressed minority, told by religion, (every) national culture, literature, television, and every other aspect of life in society that they are at the very least statistically abnormal and, at worst, "sick", immoral, and destined to go to Hell. It is not possible for gay men to immerse themselves in the dominant culture, which despises homosexuality, but still be well adjusted to their inner voice and personal needs. So, gay men must escape society's demands, to find a place where they can be alone, to themselves, and listen to themselves and each other, without all the dissonance of external voices and requirements.
+
But straight people today won't let gay men be alone. Instead, straights insist that circumstances have so changed, and gay men are now so free, that they need no longer segregate themselves into a "gay ghetto", but can integrate fully into the straight world yet still be themselves. That fatuous assumption is born of ignorance (not to say "stupidity").
+
Would straight people, were they an oppressed minority, gladly integrate themselves into a dominantly homosexual culture, or would they feel themselves perpetually and irreconcilably different and thus incapable of accepting second-class membership in (gay) society?
+
If every television commercial that strove for "sex appeal" showed two men ogling, flirting, caressing, kissing each other, would straights be comfortable with that, translating it into their own terms to mean that whoever you are attracted to, this product will help you win him or her over? Or would they find themselves excluded and oppressed, utterly and absolutely incapable of seeing themselves in a gay couple?
+
This is what naive straight people would have gay men do: see their own lives in straight relationships. Impossible! And everyone of any sense KNOWS it's impossible.
+
Straights have no conception of how thoroughly, and, for us, oppressively, (heterosexual) society is permeated by heterosexuality. They don't see the kisses between men and women as anything but ordinary. They have never for an instant considered how they would like it if every time people kissed on television and film, it was two men kissing. Every single time, year after year, decade after decade. Would they get used to it and even smile upon it? Or would they find it distasteful every single time, not just because it's not something they want to do but because they hunger for images of men kissing women — which is NEVER shown?
+
Would straight men regard still fotos and film or video footage of men kissing men as an acceptable alternative image to men kissing women? Would they feel all warm and fuzzy, and think, "Ah! Isn't that beautiful!" when they see men kissing men? Or would they be alienated and hostile, and turn away so they don't have to see it?
+
Would heterosexuals gladly accept being surrounded and outnumbered by men kissing and leering at each other? Groping each other in public?
+
Gay men are supposed to accept straight people carrying on in public. Even other straight people sometimes have to tell idiots, "Get a room!" What if everywhere around these straight individuals, men were grabbing at men, hugging and caressing men, kissing men? Would the straights compelled to witness this be blase about it? Or would they be endlessly offended, even disgusted, and possibly alarmed about losing their own sexual identity to an alien imposition?
+
If straight people had to create special little places for themselves, "straight bars", and gather together in private, to be themselves, would they welcome gay men barging in and staring at them as tho they were zoo animals, and watch them as tho observing primitive mating rituals? Or would they deeply resent the intrusion and want to be left alone, to be themselves?
+
Perhaps this gives you the tiniest bit of understanding of what it is to be homosexual in a dominantly heterosexual society. We need to left alone.
+
We don't want 'understanding' or 'sympathetic' straight people in our places. We want to be alone with each other.
+
We don't want lesbians (if there are such creatures, and gay men really, really doubt it) staring at us when we are trying to get sexual with each other.
+
We don't want straight people, of either gender, or lesbian women, speculating about our sex lives and who is going to be "the woman"/femme or "the man"/butch if we manage somehow to get together despite being spied upon by The Enemy. Straights simply don't understand that no well-adjusted gay man is "femme" or a "woman", but is always and ever a man — that we never feel so masculine as when we are alone in sexual activity with another man. They just don't "get it". And it's foolish of us to think they do.
+
Gay men go to gay bars or other gay places to meet, and possibly hook up with, other gay men. If we wanted to be with women or straight people in general, we would go to straight places. The simple fact that we go to a gay place means we want to be LEFT ALONE. Is that really such a difficult concept for straight people to understand? Well, it might be if all straight people were idiots. ARE all straight people idiots?
+
If you are straight, do not EVER go to any gay place. Ever. Do not invade our space.
+
If you are gay, and want to spend time with your straight/female friends, do so in a straight place. That's where it is appropriate for men and women to hang out together. Do NOT take women to a gay men's place. You may feel more comfortable there, but neither the woman you intrude there (who will be surrounded by men who want no part of a woman) nor the gay men who wanted to be alone with other men there, will be comfortable. Be considerate. Be intelligent. Be aware. Be sensitive. Don't take women to gay men's places. Ever.
+
And certainly do not deride or criticize any gay man who objects to your invading and thus destroying a gay place by intruding women where they just plain do not belong. I repeat: The very least that "gay" means is "homosexual", and the very least that "homosexual" means is "same sex", that is, one sex, not two. Gay is like pregnant in that regard. There is no more such a thing as "slitely straight" than there is such a thing as "slitely pregnant". A place either is or is not homosexual: one sex.
+
One sex = homosexual/gay. Two sexes = heterosexual/NOT gay. It really is that simple, and only a simpleton could fail to appreciate that.
+
The disgusting reality is that everyone knows all this, instinctually, but a very large proportion of gay men still, to this day, 37 years after Stonewall, hate themselves and each other, so will do everything in their power to try, against insuperable odds, to resist their irresistible attraction to men, and place female bodyguards between themselves and the men they want but fear. They will loudly proclaim an "antidiscriminatory" intent, and their supposed belief that 'everybody should accept everybody'. But that's not what they really feel. What they do really feel is that men and women belong together; men and men do NOT belong together; and somebody must save them from their own perverted desires, even if it is "their [own] better selves".
+
They make it impossible for themselves to cruise men, and thus avoid going off with men and 'sullying themselves' in 'immorality'. Alas, they then proceed to impose their own dysfunction upon others, and do everything in their power to keep ALL gay men from meeting each other and getting together. Why do we permit this?
+
Alas, the laws are written by straight people, and they are so consumed by feminist-induced guilt about what they as straight men have been doing 'to' women that they displace onto gay men their own guilts. We are to pay for STRAIGHT men's lack of attention to and support of their wives or girlfriends. WE are to pay for straight men's refusal to clear the table or wash dishes, vacuum the rugs or change the baby.
+
Leave us out of it! We have nothing to do with your debts relative to women. We're not married to women, and would not ever be married to a woman, under any circumstances, even if a gun were put to our head. Make your own amends for your own sins. Leave us out of it.
+
If truth be told — tho the whole truth is rarely told in this country, in this age — gay men don't believe in lesbianism. Oh, we've been told it's real, that there are lots of women who crave sex with women. We just don't believe it. Our base question is "What can they do? Bump pussies?" We just don't believe it.
+
We know that homosexuality (men-with-men) is real — very, very real. We know we get, hm, how can we say this in mixed company? "physically aroused" on SEEING a man we find attractive. We are irresistibly, powerfully, massively impelled to sex with men. And we love it.
+
We do not for an instant believe that "lesbians" have any such powerful sexual feeling for women. There are no sex places for lesbians, no baths, no trucks, no parks, no rest stops on the interstate. Sex between women is a fraud, an urban legend. If it ever happens at all, it is an aberration, a rarity, a companion to an emotional relationship in women whose sex lives are empty.
+
In gay men, by contrast, sex is primary, the top of everything. We want it, we look for it, we hunt for it, we get it. And if we don't get it, we are actively miserable. We can't go weeks or months without it just because we aren't "in love". Sex in itself is enuf. We love it, we want it, we've got to have it, because sex between men is so wonderful as to be inexpressible. Words fail us. THAT is homosexuality.
+
We don't go to gay bars to chat. We go to look for somebody hot.
+
It is as inhibiting to us to have a woman — any woman, "lesbian" (ha!) or straight — watching us as it would be for straights to try to hook up for casual sex in front of Father Murphy or Sister Mary Katherine. Even if Father Murphy or Sister Mary Katherine wouldn't actually step physically between us and our intended sexual conquest to stop us from going home with each other, their mere presence, intently watching what we do, would be powerful interference with our sex lives. Is that so hard to understand?
+
The moral of this story is, (1) if you are straight, do not EVER go to a gay bar — ever; and (2) if you are gay, do not EVER bring women ("lesbian" or straight doesn't matter) or straight men into a gay bar or any other gay situation. There are many other hours of your day or life, when it is (reasonably) appropriate to mix genders and orientations. A gay bar is not the place; when gay men want to be with other gay men is not the time.
+
"Birds of a feather flock together." The human race has known that for a very long time:
Individuals of like character, taste, or background (tend to stay together), as in The members of the club had no trouble selecting their yearly outing--they're all birds of a feather. The idea of like seeks like dates from ancient Greek times, and "Birds dwell with their kind" was quoted in the apocryphal book of Ecclesiasticus. The full saying in English, Birds of a feather flock together, was first recorded in 1545. [Emphasis in original]
Why, then, do we have such trouble with this concept in the United States today?
+
Endlessly we are lectured — indeed, practically pummelled — into accepting that we "should" ignore all differences among people and be friends with and spend essentially all our time with people with whom we share NOTHING. The ordinary course of human relationships rejects all such advice and compulsion. Decade after decade, century after century, people cling to their own kind. It's not rejection of others but simply affection for one's own.
+
It's not evil. It's not conspiratorial. It's just simple human nature. Why can't we ALL accept that, and let people be with whom they want to be without making it into a humungous moral issue?
+
Gay men are a pervasively (indeed astoundingly) oppressed minority, told by religion, (every) national culture, literature, television, and every other aspect of life in society that they are at the very least statistically abnormal and, at worst, "sick", immoral, and destined to go to Hell. It is not possible for gay men to immerse themselves in the dominant culture, which despises homosexuality, but still be well adjusted to their inner voice and personal needs. So, gay men must escape society's demands, to find a place where they can be alone, to themselves, and listen to themselves and each other, without all the dissonance of external voices and requirements.
+
But straight people today won't let gay men be alone. Instead, straights insist that circumstances have so changed, and gay men are now so free, that they need no longer segregate themselves into a "gay ghetto", but can integrate fully into the straight world yet still be themselves. That fatuous assumption is born of ignorance (not to say "stupidity").
+
Would straight people, were they an oppressed minority, gladly integrate themselves into a dominantly homosexual culture, or would they feel themselves perpetually and irreconcilably different and thus incapable of accepting second-class membership in (gay) society?
+
If every television commercial that strove for "sex appeal" showed two men ogling, flirting, caressing, kissing each other, would straights be comfortable with that, translating it into their own terms to mean that whoever you are attracted to, this product will help you win him or her over? Or would they find themselves excluded and oppressed, utterly and absolutely incapable of seeing themselves in a gay couple?
+
This is what naive straight people would have gay men do: see their own lives in straight relationships. Impossible! And everyone of any sense KNOWS it's impossible.
+
Straights have no conception of how thoroughly, and, for us, oppressively, (heterosexual) society is permeated by heterosexuality. They don't see the kisses between men and women as anything but ordinary. They have never for an instant considered how they would like it if every time people kissed on television and film, it was two men kissing. Every single time, year after year, decade after decade. Would they get used to it and even smile upon it? Or would they find it distasteful every single time, not just because it's not something they want to do but because they hunger for images of men kissing women — which is NEVER shown?
+
Would straight men regard still fotos and film or video footage of men kissing men as an acceptable alternative image to men kissing women? Would they feel all warm and fuzzy, and think, "Ah! Isn't that beautiful!" when they see men kissing men? Or would they be alienated and hostile, and turn away so they don't have to see it?
+
Would heterosexuals gladly accept being surrounded and outnumbered by men kissing and leering at each other? Groping each other in public?
+
Gay men are supposed to accept straight people carrying on in public. Even other straight people sometimes have to tell idiots, "Get a room!" What if everywhere around these straight individuals, men were grabbing at men, hugging and caressing men, kissing men? Would the straights compelled to witness this be blase about it? Or would they be endlessly offended, even disgusted, and possibly alarmed about losing their own sexual identity to an alien imposition?
+
If straight people had to create special little places for themselves, "straight bars", and gather together in private, to be themselves, would they welcome gay men barging in and staring at them as tho they were zoo animals, and watch them as tho observing primitive mating rituals? Or would they deeply resent the intrusion and want to be left alone, to be themselves?
+
Perhaps this gives you the tiniest bit of understanding of what it is to be homosexual in a dominantly heterosexual society. We need to left alone.
+
We don't want 'understanding' or 'sympathetic' straight people in our places. We want to be alone with each other.
+
We don't want lesbians (if there are such creatures, and gay men really, really doubt it) staring at us when we are trying to get sexual with each other.
+
We don't want straight people, of either gender, or lesbian women, speculating about our sex lives and who is going to be "the woman"/femme or "the man"/butch if we manage somehow to get together despite being spied upon by The Enemy. Straights simply don't understand that no well-adjusted gay man is "femme" or a "woman", but is always and ever a man — that we never feel so masculine as when we are alone in sexual activity with another man. They just don't "get it". And it's foolish of us to think they do.
+
Gay men go to gay bars or other gay places to meet, and possibly hook up with, other gay men. If we wanted to be with women or straight people in general, we would go to straight places. The simple fact that we go to a gay place means we want to be LEFT ALONE. Is that really such a difficult concept for straight people to understand? Well, it might be if all straight people were idiots. ARE all straight people idiots?
+
If you are straight, do not EVER go to any gay place. Ever. Do not invade our space.
+
If you are gay, and want to spend time with your straight/female friends, do so in a straight place. That's where it is appropriate for men and women to hang out together. Do NOT take women to a gay men's place. You may feel more comfortable there, but neither the woman you intrude there (who will be surrounded by men who want no part of a woman) nor the gay men who wanted to be alone with other men there, will be comfortable. Be considerate. Be intelligent. Be aware. Be sensitive. Don't take women to gay men's places. Ever.
+
And certainly do not deride or criticize any gay man who objects to your invading and thus destroying a gay place by intruding women where they just plain do not belong. I repeat: The very least that "gay" means is "homosexual", and the very least that "homosexual" means is "same sex", that is, one sex, not two. Gay is like pregnant in that regard. There is no more such a thing as "slitely straight" than there is such a thing as "slitely pregnant". A place either is or is not homosexual: one sex.
+
One sex = homosexual/gay. Two sexes = heterosexual/NOT gay. It really is that simple, and only a simpleton could fail to appreciate that.
+
The disgusting reality is that everyone knows all this, instinctually, but a very large proportion of gay men still, to this day, 37 years after Stonewall, hate themselves and each other, so will do everything in their power to try, against insuperable odds, to resist their irresistible attraction to men, and place female bodyguards between themselves and the men they want but fear. They will loudly proclaim an "antidiscriminatory" intent, and their supposed belief that 'everybody should accept everybody'. But that's not what they really feel. What they do really feel is that men and women belong together; men and men do NOT belong together; and somebody must save them from their own perverted desires, even if it is "their [own] better selves".
+
They make it impossible for themselves to cruise men, and thus avoid going off with men and 'sullying themselves' in 'immorality'. Alas, they then proceed to impose their own dysfunction upon others, and do everything in their power to keep ALL gay men from meeting each other and getting together. Why do we permit this?
+
Alas, the laws are written by straight people, and they are so consumed by feminist-induced guilt about what they as straight men have been doing 'to' women that they displace onto gay men their own guilts. We are to pay for STRAIGHT men's lack of attention to and support of their wives or girlfriends. WE are to pay for straight men's refusal to clear the table or wash dishes, vacuum the rugs or change the baby.
+
Leave us out of it! We have nothing to do with your debts relative to women. We're not married to women, and would not ever be married to a woman, under any circumstances, even if a gun were put to our head. Make your own amends for your own sins. Leave us out of it.
+
If truth be told — tho the whole truth is rarely told in this country, in this age — gay men don't believe in lesbianism. Oh, we've been told it's real, that there are lots of women who crave sex with women. We just don't believe it. Our base question is "What can they do? Bump pussies?" We just don't believe it.
+
We know that homosexuality (men-with-men) is real — very, very real. We know we get, hm, how can we say this in mixed company? "physically aroused" on SEEING a man we find attractive. We are irresistibly, powerfully, massively impelled to sex with men. And we love it.
+
We do not for an instant believe that "lesbians" have any such powerful sexual feeling for women. There are no sex places for lesbians, no baths, no trucks, no parks, no rest stops on the interstate. Sex between women is a fraud, an urban legend. If it ever happens at all, it is an aberration, a rarity, a companion to an emotional relationship in women whose sex lives are empty.
+
In gay men, by contrast, sex is primary, the top of everything. We want it, we look for it, we hunt for it, we get it. And if we don't get it, we are actively miserable. We can't go weeks or months without it just because we aren't "in love". Sex in itself is enuf. We love it, we want it, we've got to have it, because sex between men is so wonderful as to be inexpressible. Words fail us. THAT is homosexuality.
+
We don't go to gay bars to chat. We go to look for somebody hot.
+
It is as inhibiting to us to have a woman — any woman, "lesbian" (ha!) or straight — watching us as it would be for straights to try to hook up for casual sex in front of Father Murphy or Sister Mary Katherine. Even if Father Murphy or Sister Mary Katherine wouldn't actually step physically between us and our intended sexual conquest to stop us from going home with each other, their mere presence, intently watching what we do, would be powerful interference with our sex lives. Is that so hard to understand?
+
The moral of this story is, (1) if you are straight, do not EVER go to a gay bar — ever; and (2) if you are gay, do not EVER bring women ("lesbian" or straight doesn't matter) or straight men into a gay bar or any other gay situation. There are many other hours of your day or life, when it is (reasonably) appropriate to mix genders and orientations. A gay bar is not the place; when gay men want to be with other gay men is not the time.
